


Please

by deathbycoldopen



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Fallen Castiel, M/M, Memory Loss, Suicidal Thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-15
Updated: 2013-03-15
Packaged: 2017-12-05 08:51:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,646
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/721192
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deathbycoldopen/pseuds/deathbycoldopen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I won't be gone long," the voice says, so quietly that his muffled ears barely catch it.  "Call me if you need anything, okay, buddy?"  There's another pause, another breath, and then something touches his forehead lightly- fingers, lips, the ghost of a memory, he can't tell what.  There's something he wants to say, something he wants to do, something he needs to remember- but the darkness is pulling him away, and with the ache beating in his chest he doesn't have the strength to resist.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Please

**Author's Note:**

> Written for deancas week '13  
> One part speculation for the rest of season 8, one part angst, and one part wishful thinking. Enjoy!

He feels pain somewhere indefinable, somewhere that no longer exists inside of him.  It's a deep, throbbing ache of emptiness, not the sharp knives that sliced and bled him dry before- before? When was before? Had something existed then to hurt, or has it always been empty, the absence of pain hurting more than it should?

What happened to him?

Voices drift over him, cocooned in the darkness of unconsciousness.  They are both familiar and not at all familiar, as if the voices he knows- but how does he know them?- have been filtered through a stranger's ears and deprived of meaning by the slow current of sleep.  He listens without understanding or remembering, knowing soon he will drift away again with no sign that he listened at all.

"Dean..." someone murmurs, then pauses.  "Come on, it's been two days.  You can't just stay in here."

"It's my room, Sam, I can stay in here as long as I want."

"Dean-"

"Besides, what are you trying to say anyway?  You think we should just leave him?  God knows what kind of state he'll be in when he wakes up, Sam, and you want to-"

"No, of course not!  But Dean, you're climbing the walls, man, it's not good for you.  You need to get out, get some fresh air, maybe even catch a hunt."  A longer pause this time, the rustle of cloth as someone moves.  If he could open his eyes, maybe it would all make sense, but he can't find his eyelids in the dark, and the heavy weight of nothingness is slowly dragging him away.  "Dean... what exactly happened back there?"

"I told you what happened," someone says sharply.

"No, you told me the high school cliffnotes version.  What actually happened?"

"I _told_ you what happened, what else do you want?  He's human now, Sam, can't we just leave it at that?"

"Alright, fine."  Another pause.  "I'm serious about the hunt, though.  I think I caught wind of something a few towns over.  It would only take a few days, and we can be back here in no time."  Pause.  "Look, we can call Jody or someone to keep an eye on him while we're gone.  You need this, Dean."

Someone sighs, a long, drawn-out sound that stirs the air around his breath.  He wants to breathe it in, curious if there's more life in that touch of air than in his own lungs.  But his breath continues as before, distant and unfeeling.  "We come back as quickly as we can," that someone insists eventually.

"Of course."

"Go call Jody, I'll be out there in a minute."

"Yeah, okay."

Footsteps, and another deep sigh.  It brushes across his face, and he wants to turn toward it, though he doesn't know why.  The familiar and unfamiliar voice moves in the same aching, empty space dragging him down, and he wonders what it all means.

"I won't be gone long," the voice says, so quietly that his muffled ears barely catch it.  "Call me if you need anything, okay, buddy?"  There's another pause, another breath, and then something touches his forehead lightly- fingers, lips, the ghost of a memory, he can't tell what.  There's something he wants to say, something he wants to do, something he needs to remember- but the darkness is pulling him away, and with the ache beating in his chest he doesn't have the strength to resist.

 ---

_please_

Cas wakes slowly, laboriously, like dragging himself out of thick, black tar.  There's an ache somewhere deep inside him that's trying to drag him back down; he fights back, struggling into wakefulness.

Everything around him is unfamiliar; he can tell before he's opened his eyes that he's never been here before.  The mattress he's lying on conforms to the shape of his vessel perfectly, cushioning every inch of him- he's never felt a mattress this soft before.  The space around him feels confined, stale, except for the touch of a breeze from a fan somewhere off to the side.  Somewhere with no windows, perhaps.

Wherever he is, he's not alone.

His vessel's heart beats faster as he recognizes the presence in the room- and the pounding feels oddly sharp, connected to himself in a way that disturbs him.  He doesn't examine why that might be, instead focusing on the other person, the one making his vessel's heart pound and his vessel's stomach flutter.

"Dean," he murmurs, then opens his eyes.

He blinks.  His vessel's eyes refuse to focus, instead drifting dizzyingly over the unfamiliar room.  He frowns and blinks again- this has never been a problem before, is there something wrong with his vessel?  He looks around, tracing the shape of the bed, the walls, the desk, the dresser, the chairs, looking for his friend.

Dean isn't there.

He blinks yet again, and rubs his vessel's eyes for good measure.  When he opens them again, everything is much sharper- but still there's no one.  Not Dean, not anybody.  He frowns.  He'd been so sure that Dean was there.  When his eyes are closed in the time it takes to blink, he can still feel Dean's presence in the room.  But he's alone.

Alone.  It's more than just the empty room.  He's alone in himself as well.  He can't hear his brothers and sisters singing to one another, can't hear the background buzz of prayer, or of birds flying outside, the bees, the flowers, the wind- it's all gone.  Something is wrong with him.

He lifts a hand and finds that it's shaking, because _he's_ shaking.  This hand, this body, is part of him, and it's all there is to him.  He's just a body, existing on a single plane of existence in a clumsy, useless meatsuit.

He's human.

Something writhes inside his vessel's- no, _his_ \- stomach.  He curls in on himself, fighting the sudden nausea with deep, instinctive breaths that wouldn't have been necessary when this body wasn't his.  Human.  His head is spinning, he can barely think.  His breath comes faster and faster.  Human, how is he human?  What happened to him?

Tentatively, he reaches into his memory, trying to sift through the thick, muffling blanket of sleep until-

Pain.

He almost shouts at the shock, but it's only a memory.  The place where the pain seared doesn't even exist anymore.  His grace is gone now, leaving just the ache and the echo.

He tries to look further back than the pain, but it's like looking through murky water with human eyes.  Vague shapes shift in his memory, but he can't make them out, can't understand what they mean.  Is this what all human memory is like, lost under the passage of time and the shadow of pain?

No, there are things he does remember.  He remembers endless years watching the earth, fighting with his brothers and sisters, waiting patiently for orders and following them without question.  He remembers fighting his way through Hell and seeing Dean for the first time, remembers pulling him out and remaking him.  He remembers rebelling against his family and gaining a new one in the process, remembers saving the world with them, only to lose them too across a line of holy fire.  He remembers the things he did, the deal he made with Crowley, the door he opened that ought to have stayed closed, the angels he massacred, the humans he terrorized, the things he said to Dean and the way Dean looked at him, angry and hurt.  He remembers the things he let into this world, helping Dean kill their king, and the endless filth of Purgatory.

But that's where the memories become murkier, some standing out sharply and others lost in a thick fog.  Dean's face when he let go in Purgatory.  A roadside in Illinois where he woke with no idea how he got there.  Dean and Sam, Kevin, Crowley, a hunt, people to save.  The way Dean looked when he slept under a stolen glance.  Samandriel's screams-

Samandriel.  He'd gone to rescue him, but instead he'd... he'd...

What has he done?

Cas closes his eyes tightly, searching his memory for a clue, anything telling him why he'd done that, and why he'd taken his blade and...  The memory has to be there, he just has to find it, some magical moment that will explain everything, make it all better.  It has to be there.

_please_

He frowns.  It's not a full memory.  He can't access it, not even to find out who said it.  He digs ruthlessly, ignoring the headache beginning to build up behind his eyes.  If he still had his grace, the headache wouldn't have even registered; he can't let it affect him now.

_do it, Castiel_

_bright blue eyes like ice_

The pressure in his head is quickly becoming unbearable, sending shocks of pain like lightning into the space where his grace once was.  He keeps searching, struggling to make sense of the flashing colors and sounds and sensations.

_he brought the blade to his chest, ready to end it all_

The graceless space spasms and he gasps.

_hands clenching around his wrists, but someone was screaming at him and he had to_

_please_

The pain is too much.  Cas moans and curls into himself even tighter, letting the memory slip away.  He waits, panting, for the pain to subside; it recedes slowly, leaving behind twin aches in his head and his chest.

He takes the deep breaths his human body seems to require, then straightens carefully.  If he can't reach the memories that way, he'll have to figure something else out.  He might ask someone- ask Dean- but he knows it wouldn't do any good.  He remembers Dean's face when he let go in Purgatory, after all; he knows he would never burden Dean with his choice between suicide and falling.

He remembers putting the blade against his chest.  Why had he fallen instead?  Why did he do this to himself?

Cas sits up, maneuvering his legs slowly out from the covers and onto the floor as he looks around the room.  Where is he?  He's never been here before, he's sure, but there's something familiar about it nonetheless, something he can't quite-

His eyes fall on the display of guns on the wall, and the crude blade hanging in the center, and it clicks.  That's Dean's blade from Purgatory.  And that's his jacket hanging on the wall in the corner, and a picture of his mother placed reverentially on the desk.  The pillow even smells like Dean, and Cas realizes with a jolt that the reason he'd thought Dean was in the room with him was because he'd been smelling the pillow in his sleep.

This must be Dean's room then, though Cas doesn't know when Dean got a room to call his own, to decorate like this.  How much time had passed while Cas' memory was covered in fog?

His stomach squirms again, but this time he recognizes the feeling from the time he'd spent practically human: hunger.  He's been asleep for a while, he thinks, long enough for his human body to need food.  Maybe the memories will be easier to access once his body has been fueled.

He gets to his feet shakily, hating that he has to lean on the wall for support.  He looks over and finds that his trench coat has been draped across the back of a chair; he rushes over as best he can, smiling a little once it's wrapped around him again.  With the familiar weight on his shoulders he feels better, more grounded, more like himself.  The memory of Dean offering it to him passes through Cas' mind.  The coat never meant much to him until Dean kept it for a year, even after everything he'd done.  Now it's an anchor, his own bloody little security blanket.

Cas shakes the thought away and makes his way out the door.

Dean's room opens into a long, dark hallway.  Cas hesitates, looking around but unable to make anything out except for a faint light at one end of the hall.  "Dean?" he calls.  His voice cracks around the word, his throat sore as if he'd been screaming.  He probably had been.  "Dean?" he tries again, more successfully this time.  "Sam?"

Someone moves beyond the hall, a sharp click of footsteps that's all wrong, nothing like the soft clump of boots that the Winchesters make when they walk.  Cas shrinks back against the wall, panic building inside him.  He's so blind as a human, so weak; he would probably do more harm to himself than an attacker if he tried to defend himself.

_Good._   The thought drifts through his mind unbidden, and he doesn't examine it, too preoccupied with the stranger now coming toward him.

"You're awake!" the woman says.  She notices his stance and slows down, holding her hands up as if she's approaching a wild animal.  "Hey, it's okay," she says calmly.  "My name's Jody, Jody Mills.  Sam and Dean called me over to keep an eye on you while they work off some cabin fever."

Cas frowns.  Her name sounds vaguely familiar, and she isn't a demon, at least- even as a human he'd be able to tell.  Some of the panic stirring in his gut recedes, leaving him with a bitter aftertaste.  "They're gone?" he asks quietly.

"Just for a few days," Jody says.  "From what I hear, Dean was climbing the walls waiting for you to wake up, and Sam wasn't doing much better.  Sam said he was gonna strangle his brother if they didn't find a monster to kill instead."  She shakes her head in equal parts exasperation and fondness.  "Tell the truth, I'm not sure how those boys manage to be around each other all the time without slaughtering each other."  She smiles, inviting Cas to share in it.

Cas smiles hesitantly in return, hoping she can't tell that his heart is sinking.  Of course the Winchesters are on a hunt: they're men of action, after all, especially Dean.  Waiting around a bedside would drive them both crazy, as would trying to help a newly-fallen angel adjust to being human.  They have more important things to take care of, things that Cas is now too weak to help them with.  Even if he wasn't, what could he possibly do to help them, now that he's human and powerless?

His stomach rumbles loudly, distracting him from the thought and reminding him why he left the room that felt so much like the warmth of Dean's arms wrapped around him.  The hallway is cold and empty, but he needs food.

Jody raises her eyebrows at the sound.  "Hungry?" she asks.  He nods mutely.  She chuckles a little bit and gestures him forward.  "Come on, I'll fix you something."

He follows her down the hall, blinking when they step into a much brighter room.  It's huge, he realizes as his eyes adjust, large and airy and lined with books.  Sam must love it here.

"Where are we?" he asks.

Jody contemplates the room.  "I'm not really sure," she says.  "The boys found this place a while back and made themselves at home, as far as I can tell.  Dean was talking about a secret organization and some kind of legacy, but to be honest I didn't really follow.  He seemed pretty proud of the place, though."

Cas nods again.  He'd seen Dean's pride in every line of his room, carefully arranged with a loving eye.  It's good to know that the boys have a home now.  They've never had that before.

"Kitchen's through here," Jody continues, then stops, looking at Cas.  "You know what, why don't you sit down and I'll fetch you something."

"I can help," he says, though he doesn't know anything about food preparation.  But he could at least do _something_.

She grabs his arm gently and steers him toward a chair.  He jumps a little at the contact.  The only person he ever really touches is Dean; he isn't quite sure what to do with the unfamiliar hand on his arm.  "I'm sure you can," Jody says.  "But right now, you need to sit.  You look like death warmed up."

He sinks into the chair and his legs cry out in relief.  He can't even walk around anymore, apparently.  Death warmed up, is that what he is?  He's so weak and useless now, he might as well be dead.

Or is it, he _should_ be dead?  He doesn't really know the difference anymore.

"I'll be right back," Jody says, and disappears into another hallway.

He watches her go, and wishes he could go with her, wishes he didn't need her to look after him.  He's thousands of years old, he ought to be able to prepare his own food.  But he doesn't have the strength, and he doesn't know how; all his years don't give him the right tools for living a human life.  He's weak, and he's useless, so useless.

Why had he done this to himself?

Cas puts his head in his hands and tries to remember to breathe.  He'd done this to himself, purposefully taken away his own ability to help anyone, to atone for all the things he's done.  He can't do anything for anyone anymore, there's no reason for him to even _exist_ anymore, and yet here he remains.  Alive, breathing, human, useless.  And he doesn't even know _why_.

There has to be a reason; he had to have had a reason for doing this, some reason to keep his life but not himself.  Carefully, he sifts through his memory again, not trying to force it this time, just looking.

_do it Castiel_

The memories scatter and reform, dancing on the edge of pain before they slip away like wisps of fog.

_do it_

_he knew what he had to do_

_I'm sorry_

_those familiar green eyes, so desperate for something he couldn't give_

Cas blinks.  Dean.  Those were Dean's eyes in his memory.  He can't remember anything else, any context for why Dean was there, what he was so desperate for.  But he'd been there when it happened.

_please_

Jody reappears after a little while, somehow balancing two plates and two glasses of water in her arms at the same time.  "I called Sam to let them know you're awake," she says.  "He said they're hunting a ghost a few towns over, but it should be a quick job so they'll probably be back tomorrow."  She sets everything down on the table, juggling a little bit to avoid dropping the sandwiches all over the floor.  "Here you go.  It's not gourmet or anything, hope you don't mind."

"Thank you," Cas murmurs.  He picks his sandwich up delicately.  It's not as if he's never eaten anything before- though he doesn't want to think about his experience with Famine- but this seems different.  The first food that will go into a body that is _his_.  It feels as if it will somehow seal him in more irrevocably than the removal of his grace.

He sighs and takes a bite, letting his body's instincts take over.  It is tasty, he has to admit.

They eat in silence.  Cas has never known how to just talk to people; they always look put off by what he says, though often he doesn't know why.  The only people he feels comfortable talking with are Sam and Dean, and even they give him strange looks on a regular basis.  Trying to make small talk with a stranger was a little beyond him.

Still, he's human now.  He won't be able to get away with only talking to Sam and Dean, especially not when they go off hunting.  He has to learn sometime.

"How do you know Sam and Dean?" he asks.  "Are you a hunter too?"

Jody seems surprised that he said anything, but not put off at least.  "Not quite," she says with a smile.  "I'm a sheriff up in Sioux Falls."

Cas frowns.  "I thought they tried to avoid entangling with law enforcement," he says, confused.

"Well, when my whole town was filled with zombies and they seemed to be the only guys who understood what was going on, so I gave them the benefit of the doubt," she says.  "They've helped me out a bit since then, when those Leviathan things were eating folks down at the hospital, and I've tossed a case or two their way.  They're good boys."

Cas looks away, trying to hide the surge of emotion swimming around that word.  Leviathan.  The monsters he let into this world.  He may have helped Dean kill their king, but who knows how many people had died in the meantime.  Because of him.

_Add it to the body count_ , he thinks bitterly.

Jody leans over, peering at him.  "Hey, are you alright?"

"I'm fine," he says.

"'Cause it's alright if you're not, you know," Jody continues, still looking at him with discerning eyes.  "It happens to the best of us."

"And I'm only human, right?" he says.  He wonders when he started to talk like Dean, all sharp edges and sarcastic quips.

Jody pauses at that.  "I guess you are," she says after a moment.  She hesitates again, then says, "Sam told me what happened.  What you- what you are.  I gotta say, monsters I can handle, but I was a little shocked to find out about angels."

"No need to worry," Cas says quietly.  "There are so few of us left that we might as well not exist."  So few that he hadn't killed.  So few, and he can't even hear the ones that were left.  He is alone.  "I don't count as an angel anymore, anyway.  Not that I ever was much of one to begin with."  He'd thought he was, once.  Now he knows he's always been a walking blasphemy, he'd just hidden it well.

Jody looks a little at a loss for what to say.  She reaches forward hesitantly and pats his shoulder.  He twitches in surprise.  "It'll get better," she says, though she doesn't sound very confident.  How could she?  She only learned that angels exist a little while ago, and now she's faced with a newly fallen angel.  She doesn't know if it will get better; and Cas highly doubts that it will.  "Sam and Dean will be back in a day or two," she continues.  "They'll sort you out.  Take care of you.  They obviously care a lot about you."

It's meant to be comforting, but Cas' heart drops.  Sam and Dean taking care of him, like a child ( _you're a freaking child Cas, you know that?_ he hears, the memory of a dark room and Dean's angry voice).  They'll be stuck in here with him, because Cas is too weak to go out and help them, and they'll call Jody in to babysit when the waiting drives them crazy.  They'll hate every second of it, Cas weighing them down until nobody can move.  Not just a child: a burden.

"Right," he says quietly.  They sit in silence for a moment.  Finally Cas gets to his feet, still shaky but able to stand without leaning on the chair.  "I'm going to sleep some more," he says.

Jody eyes him a little bit, but doesn't discourage him.  "Alright," she says.  "I'll be out here if you need anything."

He smiles at her.  "Thank you," he says.  She must have better, more important things to do than to look after him.

"No problem."

He makes his way back to Dean's room and lies down on Dean's bed; but he sits up immediately, clutching the edge of the mattress until his knuckles turn white.

He can't do this.  He can't sleep as a human, surrounded by Dean's things and his smell and his presence.  He can't lie down on Dean's bed and pretend that he deserves any of this, deserves to be taken care of when he can't do anything in return, just drag everyone around him down.  He doesn't deserve it.  He's just a useless sack of meat now, a burden to anyone he comes in contact with.

Why did he choose this?  Why did he rip out his grace and not have the decency to finish the job?  Was he really that much of a coward that he couldn't do it properly, instead forcing himself into this pitiful existence?  What the hell had been so important that he'd decided to burden the world with this sad echo of himself- burden the Winchesters, burden Dean.

Dean.  How could he do this to _Dean_?  For so long Dean is the only thing he's been fighting for.  Give Dean a reprieve, no matter how short.  Lift the weight from his shoulders just a little bit, because Dean deserves better than all the pain and responsibility the world has thrown at him.  Dean deserves better than yet another burden placed on his shoulders, yet another responsibility.  He deserves better than Cas.

Cas looks down at his hands.  He can't do this.  He can't stay here, accepting Dean's help when he knows it will only bring Dean more hardship.  He can't do it.

He has to get out of here.

 ---

He waits.  He hears Jody move walk past and close a door further down the hall around eleven, but he doesn't move.  He waits until the clock on the desk reads 1:00 am, when he's sure she's asleep, before quietly getting to his feet.

He's rational about what he takes, despite the squirming guilt in his stomach at taking anything from Dean.  He knows that a missing duffel, a few shirts, and some cash will weigh much less than caring for a fallen angel.  In the long run, Dean will be better off with him gone, and he can't go without means to support himself.

He hesitates before taking on of Dean's long knives.  Clothes and money are one thing- Dean would hardly miss them- but weapons are something else altogether.  Dean lives and breathes by his weapons; he'd be livid if one went missing.  But Cas is powerless now, and he knows what is out there in the dark.  He hopes Dean won't begrudge him a means of protection, small as it is.

He finds his way to the kitchen and takes some food as well, little things that don't require preparation.  He doesn't take that much, but the duffle feels too heavy as he walks through the dark main room.  Heavy with supplies or heavy with guilt, he doesn't know.

He's halfway up the stairs leading toward the exit when the lights flash on.

"Cas?"

He stops, heart pounding, and looks up.  Dean stares at him from the top of the stairs with an odd expression, frozen somewhere between a smile and a frown.  Sam stands behind him, glancing between his brother and Cas.  Both Dean and Sam sport injuries, some new but most of them a few days old at least: there's bruising all around Sam's jaw and Dean's eye, and Dean's wrist is in a cast.

"Dean.  Sam," Cas says, his mind unhelpfully blank.  "I thought... Jody said you were coming back tomorrow."

"Yeah, well it turned out to be an open and shut case, so we thought we'd come back early," Dean says.  Sam shoots him a look, but Dean ignores it.  "What are you-"

Dean stops talking abruptly, his eyes on the duffle.  The smile slips off his face, leaving it horribly blank.  If Cas could move, he would take a step back; but he's frozen, locked in Dean's gaze.

"Going somewhere, Cas?" Dean asks finally.

Cas swallows.  "I'm just..." he begins, but he can't find the words to finish the sentence.  He looks at the railing, avoiding the look in Dean's eyes.

The silence stretches, getting thicker and thicker with tension as each second passes.  It feels like a storm is building around them, raising the hairs on the back of Cas' neck with static electricity.  He understands, now that he's human, why people often moved carefully around Dean when he was angry.  He'd never thought that Dean could be so terrifying.

Sam shifts uncomfortably.  "I'm gonna..." he says, and the words barely penetrate the harsh silence.  He pushes past Dean to walk down the stairs, but pauses next to Cas.  "It's good to see you on your feet," he says, clapping him on the shoulder, and the look he gives him is a good luck wish.

Sam's footsteps recede into the distance, and Dean is still staring at Cas in silence.  Cas looks at the railing studiously, wishing he knew what to say.

Finally, Dean exhales sharply and strides down the stairs.  Cas tries not to flinch away from him, but all he does is snatch the duffle away and storm past without a word.  After a moment, Cas follows him.

Dean throws the duffle on a table and stops, rubbing his face.  "So what," he says, turning on Cas.  "You were just gonna take off, just like that?"

"Dean-" Cas begins, but Dean cuts him off.

"No goodbye, no nothing, just gone?  _Again?_ "  Dean's anger is a coiled spring, winding tighter and tighter until it will eventually lash out, destroying everything in reach.  His whole body is shaking with the tension.  "You always fucking do this, you always-  And here I am thinking that after everything that happened, after-"  He stops again, swallowing his words.  There's more buried in his eyes than just the anger, fear and hurt only half hidden under his fury.  They twist at Cas' human heart like twin daggers: he never wanted to hurt Dean, yet somehow it keeps happening, over and over again.  "God, I'm an idiot," Dean mutters to himself.

"Dean, I didn't mean to make you angry," Cas says.  _I didn't mean to hurt you,_ he wants to say, but if he did the coiled spring would snap, and neither of them would escape this unscathed.

"And you thought sneaking off in the middle of the night was the way to go, is that it?  _Where the hell were you going, Cas?_ " Dean practically hisses.

Cas shifts his weight and looks away.  "I wasn't...  I just can't stay here," he says quietly.

"Can't stay here," Dean repeats.  He rubs his face again, trying to contain the emotions spilling out from his eyes and screaming from the tension in his shoulders.  "You're _human_ now, Cas, you can't just run off and expect to be fine.  I mean, look at you, you can barely stand up straight!  What the hell is wrong with staying in one place for a few fucking days?  Why the fuck can't you stay here, huh?"

"Because I'm not worth it!" Cas snaps.  Dean stares at him, but he can't hold back anymore- well, he never really can with Dean.  "Even after everything I've done, I made myself into a burden.  I can't help anyone anymore, all I'm good for is forcing other people to take care of me like a _child_ , and I can't even remember why I did this to myself!"

Dean stares at him, his jaw still tight with anger but his eyes wide with something else.  Shock maybe, or loss.

"You don't remember?" he asks, his voice much quieter.  The tightly coiled spring is loosening into another emotion altogether.

Cas shakes his head.  "No," he says.  "I remember pain, but before that... just bits and pieces.  Going back for a while."

"What's the last thing you do remember?"

Cas looks down at the ground.  "Samandriel," he says softly.  "But I don't know..."

"You were being controlled."

He looks up again, surprised.  Dean's expression is gentle now, in the way that it so rarely is.  "Controlled?" Cas says, something nagging at his memory.  "How?"

_long silver drills in a white room_

Dean shakes his head.  "Don't really know.  That Naomi bitch did a number on your head though, it's no wonder you don't remember, I guess."

"Naomi?"

_bright blue eyes like ice_

"We think she's an angel," Dean says.  "She escaped before we could gank her though."  He narrows his eyes at Cas.  "Hey, whatever she made you do, it wasn't your fault.  Samandriel, everything, it wasn't you, understand?"

"I..."

_cold blue eyes stared him down_

_You're a hero, Castiel_

His legs won't hold him up anymore; he sits in a nearby chair, noticing distantly that his hands are shaking.  The memories are coming back, whether because Dean is reminding him of what happened, or something else knocked them loose.  Each one sends a jolt of pain into the graceless space inside him.

"Cas?  You okay?"

He nods absently.  "How did I escape?" he says.

Dean sits down as well, no longer meeting his eyes.  "We, um," he begins, then clears his throat.  "When we found out about Naomi, we tried to find her, but... you found us first."

_a dark room and two bodies thrown against the wall_

_Dean's bones cracked underneath his fingers_

_Cas-_

"You...  She made you..."

Cas looks up at him.  "She made me hurt you," he whispers.

"It wasn't you," Dean says sharply.  "Cas, you didn't do this, okay?"

There's a roaring in his ears and an ache inside him, and he can barely hear what Dean is saying.  She made him hurt the Winchesters.  Hurt Dean.  He looks down at his hands and can still feel the crunch of Dean's bones under his fingertips.  "I- Dean, I'm-"  He moves to stand, to run away, but Dean grabs his wrist firmly.

"It wasn't your fault," Dean growls, and Cas flinches away from the harsh sound.  Dean's grip on his wrist tightens.  "You have to understand that, Cas.  She was forcing you to do it."  He waits a moment, making sure that Cas won't run away before releasing him.

Wistfully, Cas wishes his hand had stayed just a little bit longer.  But no, he didn't deserve even that small comfort.

"Anyway, in the middle of kicking my ass and knocking Sam unconscious," Dean continues, "you just sort of... stopped.  It looked like you were listening, so I guess Naomi was giving you an order.  Dunno what she wanted you to do, but whatever it was, it made you short circuit or something."

_kill them, she said, they're nothing but trouble_

_no_

_put them out of their misery, Castiel_

_you're a hero, Castiel_

_kill them Castiel_

_NO_

"I guess you fought the order so hard that you snapped out of it, just for a bit," Dean says, and Cas thinks his voice has gotten softer, or maybe it's just the rush of memories slipping past him that's making the world go dim.

_do it Castiel, but all he could see was Sam lying unconscious at his feet, and Dean in his hands, blood dripping from his mouth and his eyes desperate_

_please_

"Your eyes just- cleared, you let go of me, and..."  Dean swallows and looks away.  "And you took out your angel blade.  It looked like you were still fighting her, like you only had a little bit of time left, so you... you put the blade on your chest."

_two options, but there was really only one_

_relief flooded through him, it will all be over soon_

_he knew what he had to do_

_I'm sorry_

_He looked up, one last look at what he was leaving behind, but Dean was there already, Dean was right there, those familiar green eyes desperate for something he couldn't give.  Please, he whispered.  Please, Cas, don't leave me._

_Dean leaned in closer, and kissed him._

The roaring in Cas' ears is louder now.  He can't understand anything that Dean is saying; all he knows is the memory of Dean's lips pressed against his, hard and desperate and everything Cas has always wanted but never let himself dwell on.  Dean kissed him.

_Please, Cas, don't leave me._

"Cas? Cas!"

He blinks and looks up at Dean's worried face.  "What?"

"Are you alright?" Dean asks, moving his hand hesitantly to touch his arm.  "You don't look so-"

"You kissed me," Cas says dazedly.  Before, he'd felt so alarmingly attached to this body; now, he's not even sure it exists.  He's floating somewhere distant, where the only sound is _don't leave me, don't leave me, don't leave me_ , like the beat of a heart.  "You kissed me, and then I cut out my grace."

Dean freezes, his hand still half-extended, his mouth hanging open.  From his distant cloud Cas notes that something like panic is passing through those familiar green eyes.

"You- uh," Dean says.  He stops, clears his throat, and tries again.  "You- I thought you didn't- you said you didn't remember."

"I only remembered just now," Cas says.  _Don't leave me, don't leave me, don't leave me_ , beating like a heartbeat- it's his heartbeat, he suddenly realizes.  It's his heartbeat, and those are his words.  _Please, Dean, don't leave me._

Dean abruptly gets to his feet, the chair scraping across the floor loudly when he nearly trips over it.  "Okay, great, good," he says, looking everywhere but at Cas.  "Good, so you- so you remember now, that's what happened.  I'm gonna- I gotta-"

Cas stands, grabs Dean's jacket, and yanks him into another kiss.

It's softer than before, without the desperation and panic that had jolted through the first kiss like a bolt of lightning.  This kiss is soft, warm, gentle, and Cas can feel it all the way down in his bones.  His whole world narrows down to the feel of Dean's lips against his, the taste of Dean's breath as his lips part and the kiss deepens, the warmth of Dean's mouth and the heat pooling in his stomach, the building need for more, to always have Dean's mouth moving against his, Dean's tongue inside his mouth, Dean's arms wrapped around him.

Cas might be human, but right now it feels like he's flying.

They break apart, panting a little, their faces still only a few inches apart.  Dean meets his eyes, and something in his expression is so soft and open that Cas' heart twists.  He squeezes his eyes shut, unable to bear it.

"Hey, it's okay," Dean says softly, pulling him close again, letting him bury his head in Dean's shoulder.  Dean's fingers rub the back of his neck gently.  "It's okay, I've got you."

"I'm sorry, Dean," Cas whispers into his neck.  "I'm so sorry."

"Nothing to be sorry for, Cas.  I've got you, it's okay..."  Dean murmurs soothing words, words that have no meaning and yet mean everything, mean acceptance, support, love.  Neither one of them has ever been any good at words anyway.

After a moment, a shaky breath rattles through Dean's chest, and his arms tighten around Cas almost painfully.  "Cas?"

"Yes?"  Cas lifts his head again to see Dean's eyes wide and frightened, almost like a child's.

His voice is small and quiet, so quiet that Cas can barely hear him.  "Please don't leave me," Dean whispers.

Something eases, some tension Cas has carried with him for years without ever noticing.  He leans forward and presses a sweet, chaste kiss to the corner of Dean's mouth, his head spinning with release.  "I'll stay," he promises.

Maybe it's a promise he can't keep.  A human life is just as heavy as it was before: he still has nothing to offer, no way to be useful, no way to atone for the things he's done.  He doesn't know if he'll be able to bear it, if he can carry the weight of his guilt and not crumble beneath it.  But he doesn't have to bear it alone, and maybe that will be enough.  Dean's arms around him, holding him up, helping him through- maybe it's enough.

"I'll stay," he whispers again, resting his head on Dean's shoulder.


End file.
